Summary
In fairness to the government, Canadians face serious health challenges with deteriorating urban air quality, and most will likely welcome these new initiatives. The Conservative Party stance that the Liberal government was preoccupied with climate change at the expense of other environmental issues resonates well, particularly since most Canadians aren't clear about the details of climate change anyway. Climate change and cleaner air are different issues but share many common attributes. For example, more fuel-efficient vehicles will reduce emissions of both greenhouse gases and other substances such as nitrous oxide (NOx), sulphur oxide (SOx), and paniculate matter (PM).
Turning over the fleet of licensed vehicles on the road and replacing them with less polluting vehicles is a long-term proposition. Many government incentives such as tax credits for the purchase of fuel-efficient vehicles actually contribute little to the solution in the short term. The major source of emissions comes from older vehicles, as the newer models are already relatively efficient. Old vehicles make up the majority of the fleet of licensed vehicles on the road, as the average life expectancy of a passenger car is 12 years. Some jurisdictions have experimented with "cash for clunkers" programs to induce older vehicles to be retired from the fleet. This type of program is expensive and does not address the real transportation needs of lower income Canadians who tend to own older vehicles.One of the hallmarks of the Conservative government to date is respect for the jurisdiction of provincial governments and consultations with them on initiatives where joint or concurrent jurisdictions exist It would be reasonable to assume a Conservative government wouldn't seek to intrude upon provincial jurisdiction or to add to the complexity of competing regulatory regimes. Rather, the Cleaner Air Act can be expected to build upon existing provincial and federal-provincial measures already in place, which are not insignificantKyoto skeptics have dominated the policy-making process within the Conservative Party of Canada for some time. However, now that the Conservatives are in power, the challenges of actually defining and implementing an alternate plan are proving to be more difficult than many Conservatives had likely expected. Canadian policy makers in all political parties are torn between the desire to take action on climate change as a responsible member of the international community and the economic realities Canada faces. It is important to note that the government is promising new legislation concerning cleaner air, not cleaner air itself. The title of the anticipated legislation has also been quietly changed from the Clean Air Act to the Cleaner Air Act. Good expectations management is part of the art of politics. Research and development will likely also be a major focus of the Cleaner Air Act. Fiscal incentives for developing and adopting cleaner technology can be expected.See the full content of this document
Extract
Canada's Cleaner Air Act
Kyoto sceptics have dominated the policy-making process within the Conservative Party of Canada for some time. The apparent lack of realism in the previous Liberal government's Kyoto implementation plan fostered this scepticism and the results of the plan to date have legitimized it. Greenhouse gas emissions in Canada are forecasted to increase by some 35% by 2012 over the 1990 levels, compared to the Kyoto goal of a reduction of 6% over the same period.
However, now that the Conservatives are in p...See the full content of this document
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